WP-MediaMag

How to Add Featured Article Images

If you look at the homepage of this site, you’ll see 3 featured articles show at the top; each with an image. It’s very simple to add these images.

First, get the size right. The ideal size for your featured article images is 300px wide x 200px high. If you upload an image with a size that’s different than this, the image will automatically be resized to 300×200.

Option 1 – Use the “Get The Image” Plugin

This plugin, created by a savvy WordPress developer named Justin Tadlock, will greatly simplify the task of placing your post thumbnail images right where they belong.

Download the plugin here or add it through your WordPress control panel. Install and activate.

What This Plugin Will Do

1. It will look for any images that you’ve uploaded to your post.

2. If it finds one or more images, it will automatically place the 1st image – as a your featured article image – where it belongs on your site.

3. If you have uploaded multiple images to your post, it will use the #1 image as set in the gallery section of your media uploader (click thumbnail to the right).

4. If you don’t want the image to appear in the post content, just don’t insert it into the post. The plugin will still grab the 1st image you’ve uploaded to the post and place it correctly.

5. If you don’t upload any images for the post, a default image will appear.

Option 2 – Use Custom Fields

If, for whatever reason, you prefer not to use the plugin, you can simply use custom fields. With this method, you will need to scroll down to the Custom Fields section on the Write Post screen and fill in the appropriate data.

For featured article images:

• Name = home_feature_photo
• Value = the URL for the image (get the image URL from the media uploader)

How to Add Photo Galleries to Your Home Page

If you look at the home page of this demo site, just under the featured articles, you’ll see thumbnails for the 4 most recent photos galleries. To add the photo gallery thumbnails to your own site, you only need to do 3 things …

1. Create a new post, upload your images and insert your gallery into the post.

2. Tag the post with the tag “gallery.”

3. Visit your Theme Settings page, and select “yes” where it says “Recent Photo Galleries on Home Page.” The theme will do the rest.

How to Add Post Thumbnails to Your Posts

If you look at the home page of this site, you’ll see that each post below the featured articles has a thumbnail image next to it.

To add these images to your posts, you have 2 options …

Option 1 – Use the “Get The Image” Plugin

This plugin, created by a savvy WordPress developer named Justin Tadlock, will greatly simplify the task of placing your post thumbnail images right where they belong.

Download the plugin here or add it through your WordPress control panel. Install and activate.

What this plugin will do

1. It will look for any images that you’ve uploaded to your post.

2. If it finds one or more images, it will automatically place the 1st image – as a thumbnail – where it belongs on your site.

3. If you have uploaded multiple images to your post, it will use the #1 image as set in the gallery section of your media uploader (click thumbnail to the right).

4. If you don’t want the image to appear in the post content, just don’t insert it into the post. The plugin will still grab the 1st image you’ve uploaded to the post and place it correctly.

5. If you don’t upload any images for the post, a default image will appear unless you deactivate that feature on your Theme Settings page.

Option 2 – Use Custom Fields

If, for whatever reason, you prefer not to use the plugin, you can simply use custom fields. With this method, you will need to scroll down to the Custom Fields section on the Write Post screen and fill in the appropriate data.

For post thumbnail images:

• Name = post_thumbnail
• Value = the URL for the image (get the image URL from the media uploader)

How to Create a Site Map Page

You may have noticed the Site Map page on this site. That’s done with the built-in Site Map template, and it’s easy for you to create a site map for your own site.